[amit]

Ford models dominated the 2007 J.D.Power Initial Quality rankings beating traditional heavy weights like Toyota and Honda. Ford jumped from 16 to 10th position this year, Mercury from 17th to 8th, Lincoln from 12th to 3rd. Ford models Mustang, Lincoln Mark LT, Lincoln MKZ, Mercury Milan and the Mazda MX-5 topped their respective segments.

Mercedes and Toyota captured 3 segment awards.

Source: Autoblog.

Interesting results:

1. KIA RIO topped the sub-compact segment beating the HONDA FIT!

2. Honda Civic topped the compact segment.

3. Mercedes E class topped the mid-size premium segment. Lexus GS stood second.

4. Mercedes S class and Audi A8 topped the Premium segment. Mercedes showed dramatic improvement specially with it's new S class which improved by 63PP 100 vehicles to finish at a segment topping 72PP 100 vehicles.

5. Mercedes SL class topped the sporty premium segment beating the Porsche 911 and Lexus SC.

Top 3 models segmentwise.

Toyota dominated the truck and pick up segments, 3 of it's models, 4runner, Sequoia and Tacoma topping their respective segments.

Pick up and Truck segment rankings.

Porsche topped the nameplate rankings followed by Lexus. Mercedes improved it's ranking by 20 positions to finish fifth. Toyota came in Seventh. BMW finished 21st. Acura finished 17th and Honda came in 3rd.

Nameplate rankings.

[RX135]

At a time, when everyone was busy writing obituary on demise of Detroit giants, Ford seems to be quietly gathering itself back. How it translates to sales charts will remain to be seen though. Quality is one thing and FE is another. With rising oil prices, US market is becoming very FE conscious apart from reliability.

Mercedes declared in 2005 that Quality will be their top agenda and their cars will be as reliable as they were anytime. The initiative seems to be slowly paying off and reflects in 20 place jump in the ranking.

Porsche, which is known to produce awesome sporty but troublesome cars is topping the list for second consecutive year. Overall, Germans seem to be learning from their mistakes.

Toyota is most likely going to take it very seriously, especially the beating taken by Lexus brand. Expecting a fierce counter-measures from Toyota.

[amit]

The company that tops IQS year after year in India, Suzuki, finished 8th....................from the bottom!

Hyundai continued it's strong showing even in North America finishing 10th while Kia finished 11th. They completed the list of companies that finished over the Industry average of 125 PP 100 vehicles. How good was this showing? Hyundai finished better then heavy weight companies like BMW, Acura, Volvo, VW, Audi, Suzuki, Suburu, Cadillac etc. I guess fewer electronics in Hyundai and Kia's helped them finish higher too, neverthless, it's a very good performance indeed.

But Mercedes has delighted me, just like, I am sure it has delighted every auto enthusiast. There is still a long way to go for Mercedes' ambition to top the quality studies but they have made a start, and a bloody good one at that. Hopefully their cars will continue to be reliable in the long run too.

[RX135]

It will be unfair to say that IQS also means long term reliability. However, it is more probable than poor IQS and better long term reliability.

IIRC, Mercedes doesn't aim to top JD Power ratings. They want to be in top 3, but not necessarily top one. This is attributed to the way JD Power survey is is done (parameters like location of switches etc)

[ac 427]

surprisingly no new of skoda here. they were pretty dominant last year.

[aah78]

Originally Posted by ac 427

surprisingly no new of skoda here.

the Skoda brand isn't sold in the U.S.

[ac 427]

Originally Posted by aah78

the Skoda brand isn't sold in the U.S.

oops. . .cool. i was under the impression this is for the international quality one which JD power does

[appuchan]

Wow, the cutie MX-5 Miata. This one is an amazing piece. I had a chance to drive her in my last trip. Will remain one of the fondest memories. Hope we will start seeing such cuties here in India soon.

[theMAG]

This trend clearly indicates the progressiveness of erstwhile minnows while stagnation - not necesarrily decline, of established majors.

[vasudeva]

This is the IQS, and as you may be aware it covers initial product quality at 90 days of ownership, which is as good as new. Ford definitely deserves a pat on the back for doing so well in IQS.
But the fact is that most owners do keep their cars beyond 90 days. More keenly followed and relied upon is the JD Power 3 year vehicle dependability study (VDS). Strong showing in JD Power's VDS and other reputed surveys benefits car models. In addition to retaining their value better, brands that perform well in VDS have higher levels of owner recommendation and repurchase intent, and increased sales volumes compared to brands with average to poor dependability ratings.
The latest JD Power VDS study for the US is for 2006, which measures problems experienced by original owners of 3-year-old (2003 model-year) vehicle. Here, the rankings are:
1. Lexus
2. Mercury
3. Buick
4. Cadillac
5. Toyota
6. Acura
7. Honda
8. Jaguar
9. BMW
10. Infiniti
11. Lincoln
12. Ford
Merc is below industry average and Suzuki is 3rd from last. The last place belongs to Land Rover. Ford remained at 12th in 2005 also.

[RX135]

@vasudeva, what you said is true and I agree with it. However, for VDS, you are talking about older cars.

Mercs of 80s and 90s were over engineered and had bulletproof reliability. But, things changed in late 90s.

So, while VDS is very important for establishing brand through consistency, IQS is even more important, since it indicates current quality of the cars. If you are going to buy a car, you'll look at VDS, but you'll also make sure that the current quality standards are high and above average. You'll have to look at IQS for that.

Just as you could not say that Mercs of late 90s were of top quality, because earlier ones were benchmark for quality, you can not say that Mercs of today are poor quality, since they had poor quality 3 years back.

p.s.: I am taking Mercedes as an example and not the only I am talking of.

[supremeBaleno]

Originally Posted by amit

The company that tops IQS year after year in India, Suzuki, finished 8th....................from the bottom!

Not sure why the difference between their quality in India and US, but does the JD reports have anything to do with sample size ? Asking because during my US visits I would have seen maybe 2-3 Suzuki cars - a couple of Balenos (badged as Esteem) and a Verona.

But then I am glad they top the charts in the market where I buy from.

[devarshi84]

New mustangs any1? (its on the list)

btw interceptor is a good concept but they still need to make some good Fuel efficient cars.

And please give Lincoln cars better names.

EDit: Here comes the masterstroke.

Media-Newswire.com - Press Release Distribution - PR Agency

[Mayavi]

I am a little bit skeptic about any awards/recognition from american companies to american companies. They are always a bit biased to their homegrown products. Just read any auto mag review and you will know what I am talking about. Same applies to europeans - Top Gear is a good example.

[amit]

Originally Posted by Mayavi

I am a little bit skeptic about any awards/recognition from american companies to american companies. They are always a bit biased to their homegrown products.

These are not awards from any company. It's the J.D.Power IQS study where actual owners list down the problems they have had with their new cars within the first few months of ownership. If there was biasedness about American products then Toyota wouldn't have dominated the IQS in the years gone by. Even this year they have dominated the truck segment while Mercedes (An European company) topped three segments too.

More keenly followed and relied upon is the JD Power 3 year vehicle dependability study (VDS)

No doubt about that but in the case of Mercedes, their models were having severe quality problems when they were brand new and the improvements have been tremendous. The S class reduced it's problems by 63 PP 100 and Mercedes ranking jumped by 20 positions as compared to last year. Both the new E and S class have shown much better quality overall which means the new C class will also come with way less problems as compared to the current one. I am sure next year we will see an even better performance from Mercedes . Besides Merc models have beaten the Lexus GS, LS and SC models and thats pretty impressive.